LAMDA chair urges government action on drama schools ‘crisis’
Shaun Woodward, the outgoing chair of LAMDA (the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art), has urged the government to take action to tackle an emerging crisis in drama schools.
Writing for The Stage, Woodward said that financial problems seen at institutions such as Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, Rose Bruford College and the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama showed that “the crisis is at hand”.
Arguing that “drama training is increasingly undertaken within an impossible financial model”, the former minister for the creative industries blamed the problem on “decades of failure” by successive governments.
Calling for “strategic, unified thinking” from ministers on the links between training talent and performing spaces, Woodward said: “The canary is singing. The financial climate is increasingly toxic. We need government to act.”
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